Adventure Space Opera

Private first-class Wayson Harris was raised in a U.A. orphanage among thousands of clones born and bred as the ultimate soldiers. But Harris isn't like the other Marines: He has a mind of his own. He figures he's paying for that independent streak when his first assignment out of boot camp is the smallest Marine outpost in the whole U.A. When a rogue general surfaces, the remote desert world Harris thought was a dead-end posting becomes anything but. Fighting off the general's raid gains Harris a promotion. But it also brings him to the attention of some unfriendly U.A. leaders.

Hugo Award winner Harry Turtledove is the master of alternate history. In American Front he envisions World War I as it may have been if fought on American soil. The United States and Germany clash with the Confederacy, France, and Britain as the machines of modern warfare litter the landscape with carnage. Meanwhile, oppressed southern blacks head toward a fateful confrontation.

The 200 years' (and counting) peace was a time of tranquility that hasn't been seen since...well, ever. Mankind in the Galactic Age had finally conquered war, so what was left for the military to do but drink and barbecue? That's the kind of military that Sergeant R. Wilson Rogers lived in before he left the fleet to become a smuggler. But it turns out that smuggling is hard. Like getting-arrested-for-dealing-with-pirates-and-forced-back-into-service kind of hard.

An attitude? Why not? After all, what would you do if you were abducted by aliens and transported into a strange new universe away from your home, your family - everything familiar to you? Would it make you happy? Not likely! Now imagine you're stronger, faster, and more coordinated than every alien species you encounter. Would you start kicking some ass? Of course you would! This is the story of human superiority in the galaxy, a gritty, realistic profile of a young Navy SEAL who doesn't like aliens very much - and he makes them pay for the bad mood he's in.

First contact with a mysterious race of aliens reveals an unusual request; a family's pet dog comes to grips with the newly bestowed gift of human-like intelligence; a poet, in danger and alone on a distant world, makes unlikely allies; hundreds of years in the future, a famous hermit lives in the sea above the now-underwater Harvard University; former friends navigate unsteady peace between human refugees and the technologically superior race that saved them; in a future where human life can be infinitely extended through cybertronic rebirth, one woman declines immortality.

All Liam Avione ever wanted was to be a Deathbringer. Almost twenty years old now, he’s approaching the last six months of the decade-long training program, hopeful for his future as a protector of the Universe. One, slight problem: he’s got a genetic defect that he’s been keeping a secret. But as the training intensifies, so do his symptoms. Which are really hard to hide when they cause him to puke, pass out, and have a seizure in front of the training cadre.

Owen Deathstalker, last of the infamous warrior Clan, always considered himself more of a writer than a fighter, preferring his history books to making any actual history with a sword. But books won't protect him from Her Imperial Majesty Lionstone XIV, who just outlawed and condemned Owen to death, without any explanation, reason, or warning. No wonder she's called the Iron Bitch. Now, on the run from Imperial starcruisers, shady mercenaries, and just about everyone else in the Empire, Owen's options are limited.

January 1864: General Robert E. Lee faces defeat. The Army of Northern Virginia is ragged and ill-equipped. Gettysburg has broken the back of the Confederacy and decimated its manpower. Then, Andries Rhoodie, a strange man with an unplaceable accent, approaches Lee with an extraordinary offer. Rhoodie demonstrates an amazing rifle: its rate of fire is incredible, its lethal efficiency breathtaking - and Rhoodie guarantees unlimited quantities to the Confederates. The name of the weapon is the AK-47.

The Principal Investigator of the Chaalt people has covertly enlisted the aid of Nathan Myers and the crew of the Legacy. They desperately need help gaining access to their secret Prule research station. The facility has gone dark, and the automated defenses activated. Even the Chaalt's own advanced warships were not able to breach the shield dome and disable the cutting edge weaponry that protects the base. Nathan and his crew are in a race against time, because they believe a Prule Hivemind they once captured, now controls the facility.

Jacques McKeown is the most celebrated author of star-pilot fiction in the galaxy. He's rich, famous, and living in luxury, and his universe-wide fanbase eagerly awaits any news of his next book. There's just one small hitch. He's not Jacques McKeown. He's Dashford Pierce, star pilot and con artist, and if only the impatient calls from his publisher were the worst of his problems. There's also the last vestige of the Henderson crime gang, trouble brewing in the retired star-pilot community, and a small matter of somebody trying to kill him.

Some starship captains explore strange new worlds, seeking out new life and new civilizations. Some lead missions of discovery through wormholes to the other side of the galaxy. Then there's Captain Iridius B. Franklin, someone who spent too long seeking out strange new bars and new alien cocktails.

The year is 3326. Nigel Sheldon, one of the founders of the Commonwealth, receives a visit from the Raiel - self-appointed guardians of the Void, the enigmatic construct at the core of the galaxy that threatens the existence of all that lives. The Raiel convince Nigel to participate in a desperate scheme to infiltrate the Void. Once inside, Nigel discovers that humans are not the only life-forms to have been sucked into the Void. The humans trapped there are afflicted by an alien species of biological mimics.

For two years, the Castle Federation and the Alliance of Free Stars have stood against Marshal James Walkingstick of the Terran Commonwealth and his mission of conquest. Battles have been won and lost, worlds have died, and soldiers like Admiral Kyle Roberts have been forged on the anvil of war. But the Alliance cannot win. The Commonwealth has more worlds, more ships, more soldiers. They claim their victory is inevitable. That history is on their side. Refusing to accept the Commonwealth's future, the Alliance embarks on a do-or-die mission to end the war in one strike.

Owen Deathstalker - outlawed, with a price on his head and the blood of a mighty warrior lineage in his veins - had no choice but to embrace a dangerous destiny. With nothing to lose, only he had the courage to take up arms against Queen Lionstone XIV. Now as he gathers his unlikely allies - the legendary washed-up hero Jack Random, the beautiful pirate Hazel d'Arc, and the alien Hadenmen whose purposes no human can discern - the eyes of the downtrodden are upon him while the freedom of a galaxy hangs in the balance....

The elite crew of the pirate ship UNS Flying Dutchman had a simple mission: determining whether the Thuranin are sending another starship to Earth. Along the way, they became sidetracked by securing a future for the UNEF troops on the planet Paradise. When asked whether Earth was now safe, their ancient alien AI responded "Not so much"...now they have to deal with the consequences.

The mission is simple. Escort an emissary to an intergalactic peace summit. Try not to get in the way. Lt. Magnus and his 79th Recon Team have certainly handled worse, after all. But when an explosion rocks the tower and sends everyone into a panic, Magnus and his asset find themselves cut off from the rest of the team. Worse still, a dying alien chieftain gives them a priceless drive of intel, marking them for death. The mission has officially changed. With enemies on all sides, Magnus must do everything in his power to protect the emissary and escape the tower.

Keeping up-to-date with the most buzzworthy and cutting-edge science fiction requires sifting through countless magazines, e-zines, websites, blogs, original anthologies, single-author collections, and more - a task accomplishable by only the most determined and voracious readers. For everyone else, Night Shade Books is proud to introduce the latest volume of The Best Science Fiction of the Year, collecting the finest that the genre has to offer, from the biggest names in the field to the most exciting new writers.

The war for the fate of mankind blazes on. Though the outer defences have fallen, the walls of the Palace itself remain inviolate as Rogal Dorn, the Praetorian of Terra himself, uses every known stratagem and ploy to keep Horus' vast armies at bay. In Perturabo, the Traitor siegebreaker, Dorn faces an adversary worthy of his skill. A terrible, grinding attrition ensues. The crucial battle for the Lion's Gate spaceport is at the heart of this conflict. With it in their possession, the Traitors can land their most devastating weapons on Terran soil. Dorn knows it must not fall.

Peacetime can be a rough adjustment for the battle-hardened Merry Band of Pirates.

Especially when aliens don’t get the memo that the shooting is over.

Somewhere on the outer rim of the universe, a mass of decaying world-ships known as the Legion is traveling in the seams between the stars. For generations, a war for control of the Legion has been waged, with no clear resolution. As worlds continue to die, a desperate plan is put into motion. Zan wakes with no memory, prisoner of a people who say they are her family.